The personal attack on Musk is unwarranted and violates HN norms. I'm working with an aid organization on the ground in Ukraine desperately seeking Starlink. They currently have mobile internet but expect it lose it soon.
If Musk were posting here this would count as a personal attack. Instead he's just someone in the news, about whom commentators might freely make observations. I don't think anyone has been flagged for some of the fairly bizarre observations made about certain national leaders recently.
The Thai submarine thing - that was a poor decision on his part.
But the technical things you mention, like the stop sign “rolling stop” - I think that’s a bit slippery. Where I live, 2mph is definitely considered stopping. I would not think twice about going 2mph through a stop sign, as long as that gives me enough time to evaluate whether it is safe to proceed or actually come to a complete stop. And if it bothers you that much, you could always have put it in “cautious” mode or whatever it was called.
As far as full self-driving goes, have you seen recent versions? It is seriously impressive. Still not level 3/4 SAE so I guess it’s technically a lie, but they are working hard to make it less of a lie. It would be nice if they were more upfront with their customers about what capabilities exist today, vs what they hope to achieve in the near future.
These comments don’t help Musk at all. This just increases conviction that the Musk boosters must be ignored because they clearly have their own definitions of basic things like “stopping” and “lying.”
None of this is commentary on the underlying tech. Obviously Tesla is impressive, obviously SpaceX is impressive, obviously Musk is impressive. But none of these should absolve him/his companies/his supporters from basic obligations toward truth - especially when introducing potentially dangerous technologies to “the commons” like public roads.
